Chinese rail network predicts 440 million journeys over Lunar New Year period

China’s rail network is gearing up to accommodate an estimated 440 million rail journeys over the Spring Festival, in what is the world’s largest annual mass movement of people.

China State Railway Group estimated that an average of 11 million train trips will be taken per day during the five-week period between 10 January to 18 February, in figures reported by news portal Thepaper.cn on Monday.

This represents an eight per cent increase from last year’s figure of around 410 million.

The peak travel period, known as chunyun in China, typically sees hundreds of millions of Chinese people return to their hometowns to reunite with relatives for the Lunar New Year, which falls on January 25 this year.

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